sustainability and natural balance - your natural weight
Posted: Sat Dec 03, 2005 10:33 am
On Lane's Checkin, Freakwitch wrote:
When all you're really doing is eating at a sensible and sustainable level, how quickly you lose weight will definately be a function of how much you actually need to lose. That's another reason why I think NoS is great - your 'final'* stable weight is NOT goverened by some artificial number that either you or someone else thought up, it's governed naturally by your body, which, as it gets into balance, and will gradually get to be the correct and healthy weight for YOU.
I've seen on here that some people come and try to use NoS simply as a way to lose a load of weight, when they might not actually need to lose so much anyway. These people tend to get dissillusioned with the slow pace of things and give up I think. (I can't know this for sure, cos usually they just vanish). Perhaps they're just not ready to hear the message. Our perceptions of what is good and healthy as a society are usually way off - we try and try to get thinner and thinner to reach some "twiggy-style" supermodel ideal, yet all we ultimately get is FATTER overall. The cycle of diet and binge and diet and binge that trapped so many of us in the past ultimately only screws up the metabolism and our bodies go into "preparation for famine" mode, piling on a load of excess fat. Losing the weight isn't that hard. Keeping it off IS. Especially when your body is not in balance.
I guess what I'm trying to say (in my usual long-winded fashion ) is that the really important thing about NoS for me is NOT the weight loss. It's the fact that I feel like my body is getting into balance properly for perhaps the first time ever. Of course, I'm losing weight. I've got quite a lot of excess fat to lose, so it's not really a surprise. Yes, if you've only got a couple of pounds to lose and you really *do* need to lose it, you almost certainly WILL lose it by doing NoS seriously and properly, but it will probably take a very long time. BUT If you think you need to lose a couple of pounds, but you don't actually need to lose it, you probably WON'T lose any weight here. And I don't think that's what It should be about.
*I realise that there is no 'final weight'. What your healthy weight is will change over time depending on the level of activity you do (muscle mass vs fat), height, build and even age) but by this I mean the correct healthy weight for your body when it is in balance.
I really agree with this analysis and I started to make a reply to this on Lane's checkin too, but then realised that it was a much more general point I wanted to make. I'd be interested to see what the rest of you think.In terms of weighing, I was on No-S for nearly half a year before I started weighing myself. The weighing isn't the important thing, the doing is. Don't ever forget that. As far as losing weight as fast as me, that will be hard for most people in terms of pounds. But if you think in terms of percentage of body weight, it becomes a bit more in line. Don't forget I probably weigh at least twice what you do, and will therefore probably lose pounds twice as fast.
Put another way (weigh, heh), try thinking in terms of total body weight percentage rather than pounds. I lost 5 pounds in 10 days, but that's about 1.5 percent of my body weight (about 330 or so). So for a 150 pound person, the same percentage would be about 2.25 pounds over that same 10 days.
When all you're really doing is eating at a sensible and sustainable level, how quickly you lose weight will definately be a function of how much you actually need to lose. That's another reason why I think NoS is great - your 'final'* stable weight is NOT goverened by some artificial number that either you or someone else thought up, it's governed naturally by your body, which, as it gets into balance, and will gradually get to be the correct and healthy weight for YOU.
I've seen on here that some people come and try to use NoS simply as a way to lose a load of weight, when they might not actually need to lose so much anyway. These people tend to get dissillusioned with the slow pace of things and give up I think. (I can't know this for sure, cos usually they just vanish). Perhaps they're just not ready to hear the message. Our perceptions of what is good and healthy as a society are usually way off - we try and try to get thinner and thinner to reach some "twiggy-style" supermodel ideal, yet all we ultimately get is FATTER overall. The cycle of diet and binge and diet and binge that trapped so many of us in the past ultimately only screws up the metabolism and our bodies go into "preparation for famine" mode, piling on a load of excess fat. Losing the weight isn't that hard. Keeping it off IS. Especially when your body is not in balance.
I guess what I'm trying to say (in my usual long-winded fashion ) is that the really important thing about NoS for me is NOT the weight loss. It's the fact that I feel like my body is getting into balance properly for perhaps the first time ever. Of course, I'm losing weight. I've got quite a lot of excess fat to lose, so it's not really a surprise. Yes, if you've only got a couple of pounds to lose and you really *do* need to lose it, you almost certainly WILL lose it by doing NoS seriously and properly, but it will probably take a very long time. BUT If you think you need to lose a couple of pounds, but you don't actually need to lose it, you probably WON'T lose any weight here. And I don't think that's what It should be about.
*I realise that there is no 'final weight'. What your healthy weight is will change over time depending on the level of activity you do (muscle mass vs fat), height, build and even age) but by this I mean the correct healthy weight for your body when it is in balance.